Staff testify before congress. Most especially his former White House Counsel Don Mcgahn who has emerged as one of the stars of the Mueller Report. Robert costa of the Washington Post spoke with the president tonight by phone. The post quotes trump as saying and we quote, there is no reason to go any further and especially in congress where its very partisan, obviously very partisan. And again costa and his colleagues also report, quote, the white house plans to fight a subpoena issued by the house jow dishiary committee for former White House Counsel Don Mcgahn to testify. The administration also plans to oppose other requests for house committees for the testimony of current and former aides about actions in the white house about muellers report. White house lawyers plan to tell attorneys for administration witnesses called by the house that they will be asserting executive privilege over their testimony. More on that in a bit with a very good lawyer. Earlier today we heard trumps soninlaw and Senior AdvisorJared Kushner launch his own attacks on the Mueller Report. In his first Public Comment since the reports release, what youre about to hear is Jared Kushner diminishing the russian attack on our election. The whole things just a big distraction for the country. And you look at when russia did, buying some facebook ads to sow dissent and its a terrible thing. But i think the investigations and all the speculation thats happen frd the last two years has had a much harsher impact on democracy than a couple of facebook ads. That right there intentional on kushners part is an insult for a lot of people. For starters to the federal investigators who compiled the Mueller Report. Its also insulting to the russians who hacked into our political system and our elections so effectively. Just a reminder here, a quote from the mule report, the russian government interfered in the 2016 president ial election in sweeping and systematic fashion. By the end of the 2016 u. S. Election russias disinformation organization had the ability to reach millions of u. S. Persons through their social media accounts. In the wake of revelations about the Russia Campaign and trumps exhaustive efforts to control and end the inquiry, several prominent democrats as you know have voiced their support for impeachment hearings. Today again House Speaker nancy pelosi stressed she was not ready to take that step. Impeachment is a step that you have to take that is bringing the American People with you, again, without prejudice, without passion, without partisanship, but with a presentation of the facts. I dont think theres big division in our caucus about this. There are some people who are more eager for impeachment, many more eager to just follow the investigation where it is. As the Trump White House tries to downplay what we learned in the Mueller Report, it is openly defying House Democrats. As we said the Treasury Department missed todays deadline to turn over trumps tax returns. That request came from the chairman of the house ways and means committee. The law is pretty plain. In a ten page letter treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin outlined his concerns the request was politically motivated saying hell give his final answer may 6th after consulting with the Justice Department. House over Sight Committee is now considering holding formerer white house personnel Security Director klein in contempt after he failed to show up for hearings. Questions for him would naturally include how is it Jared Kushner got his security clearance. That same committee has also had to push back its deadline for a subpoena of trumps financial records after trump sued to block that request. Oversight chair elijah cummings, democrat of maryland spoke earlier on this network about the president s effort to stop congressional inquiries. When we allow these things to happen, basically what the congress is doing and negative the republicans in the congress is allowing President Trump our power and in turn take away the power off our constituents. Theres also news tonight about the only person convicted thus far in the Mueller Investigation. One paul manafort. Hes now officially a federal prisoner. We learned today hell do his seven plus years at the federal potentiary. The aforementioned robert costa, National Political reporter for the Washington Post, moderator of Washington Week on pbs. Maya wily, former assistant u. S. Attorney for the Southern District of new york, now with the new school here in new york. And david jolly, a former member of the Republican Party as a member of congress from the state of florida. He has since left the gop. Welcome to you all. Robert, id like to begin with you. You were doing what reporters do, working on a separate story, and i have my guesses as to what that was, dialing for dollars, looking for quotes and confirmation. You called the white house and asked to talk to the boss. He gets on the phone and after you dispense with the topic in chief, you get him going on some other topics. Thats correct. President trump weighed in on a topic everyones been trying to report today at the Washington Post and elsewhere. Is this white house actually going to assert executive privilege and prevent former officials and current officials, people like don mcgahn the former white House Counsel from going before the House Judiciary Committee putting their hands up in the air and going to testify about his conduct. White house officials signaled today this is where they were going, but then the president went on the record to articulate that strategy moving ahead. Maya wily it can be fairly asked and it will be the president , if mcgahn testified over 30 hours before the feds, whats to be gained in testimony before the house. My question to you, however, is if he waived privilege and agreed to be questioned for 30 hours they cant is suddenly say oh, no were not taking any questions, can they . Lets start with the second part of your question first because donald trump tweeted, if you recall, that he gave permission to don mcgahn to talk to Robert Mueller and his team so he explicitly and very publicly waived it. So i think its pretty clear, not to mention that the executive privilege is qualified privilege. That means its not blanket. Theres a balancing test that the courts would look at to see if in fact the interests of the president in protecting his communications outweigh or not the interests of congress. And here this goes back to the first part of your question. Congress has an interest in determining whether it should exercise its power and authority. That falls into two categories. Whether or not it would pursue impeachment. And one of things nancy pelosi is clearly saying you dont go there until you gather all the facts and see if the people are with you. And thats their job. And Robert Mueller made very clear that he thought congress should take this up. But i think the second part of it is they can legislate. Theres a lot of questions that are in Robert Muellers report that they should get to interrogate to determine whether or not they want to propose legislation on laws. Thats also their job under the constitution. David jolly, i dont want to put words in your mouth, but did i hear you with Nicolle Wallace this afternoon saying in effect in your humble opinion the democrats have been caught a little bit flatfooted by the arrival of the Mueller Report, the tonnage in it and the counter report which is just short phrase aelg from the president . I dont think theyve embraced the urgency of the moment. Contrast that with if theyd framed it by being on capitol hill to receive the report and express to the American People we believe the president s broken the law and we need to hold him accountable to find and frame the issue for the American People. Brian, i think whats going on today, donald trump is telling the American People hes terrified of being impeached. And this conversation about executive privilege its interesting they told robert they havent determined it. Every president has claimed executive privilege one way or another, going back to george washington. As maya said theres a balancing test. Washington claimed it over some National Security military excursions, ultimately gave it over to dprsz. They did not want to cooperate with Congress Request for information and ultimately federal courts said, mr. Nixon, you have to turn over the tapes and they resigned. The courts told bill clinton you have to testify or resign and he did and he was impeached. I was greatly interested in this. After you hung up with the president you were texted by members of the administration asking in effect what did the boss say to you, and you gave it as an example of just how topheavy and top down an organization the west wing is, if you can call it that. The white house, people inside of it, they know theyre about to mount a political war in the coming weeks, fighting inch by inch with Congressional Democrats about these requests. What they wanted to see inside this west wing was a signal from the top, a signal from the president. Is he prepared to mount a legal war coupled with a political war with House Democrats . Is he willing to throw this whole discussion to the federal court and have a protracted legal battle . And tonight he said that he is willing to do so. He underscored he has not made a, quote, final, final decision and thats because as the congressman said his lawyers are debating and deliberating how this would play out in the federal court. But he believes he can make a case to the country and to the federal court and at the end of the day talking to Top White House officials they say if they do find in the court it buys them time, thats what the president want as they fight that political war. He even famously let you witness his hair process which caused unending envy by reporters when you were traveling on his plane years ago. That being said, having had a lot of contact with him, how did you find him tonight . What kind of mood was he in . This is a president as defiant as ever, and hes prepare today have a constitutional battle. I mean, this isnt a dramatic moment for the country. You have a president who really wants to fight nottant asserting executive privilege but fight congress at every juncture, at every request. And you look at the Washington Post report tonight, its not just about don mcgahns testimony, its across all these fronts that House Democrats are sending letters to the white house, and the president on the phone tonight was the same kind of person i first encountered as a reporter years ago. This is someone who actually relishes these kinds of fights but now its so different in the president ial campaign or new york or business. This is constitutional questions being challenged, and were entering a new period in this presidency has he confronts all of that. David jolly, lets back up to the point you just made. I watch a lot of cable news. And tonight on more than one occasion i heard reporters say were going to court and we may be headed for a constitutional crisis, and that puts a lump in your throat if you love this place as i do . But why am i hearing that from journalists . Recall what happened when the starr report was delivered, volumes, dozens of volumes. And the Republican Congress isolated ninetyfour different incidents and said these are the charges were going to levy against the president. I think democrats in the house have enough information to call for a vote right now, and i think what they should do is isolate one or two moments, the don mcdpan moment being probably first and foremost. Did donald trump tell him foofire bob mueller, and did donald trump instruct staff to demoralize that action is prima facia obstruction of justice. Ill ask it anyway, your reaction to hearing a Senior Advisor to the president , soninlaw to the president today dismiss the russia matter as a couple of ads on facebook. Business as usual for this white house is to refuse to assert National Security interests of the nation to defend their own narrow interests. So remember when the facebook just facebook. This is social media platforms included, instagram, twitter, youtube. It wasnt just facebook. But facebook alone were efforts to tell black voters and latina voters not to vote or to confuse them about where to go vote. It was things like ads saying, you know, honor the badge and, you know, prevent the invaders from coming. I mean it was divisive. The intent was to divide the country. And that is something that no one who is in the white house or frankly no one who resides in this country should tolerate. And the fact that you have a Jared Kushner who is in a meeting in trump tower in july 2016 actively trying to get emails from russians, from foreign nationals known to be connected to the kremlin, i wont go on because its all in the Mueller Report. Now comes forward and suggests that none of that matters is very selfserving. Secondly, the only other point i think is so important to make here we should not lose is this is the same Jared Kushner who was part of a campaign that was told in the summer of 2016 by the fbi that russians were going to try to interfere in the election and please tell them about any contacts with russians. Yeah. Let the transcript reflect that maya wily at that point stopped talking and looked her her colleague david jolly. Our thanks to our guests robert costa, maya wily and david jolly for starting us off in fine fashion this tuesday night. Coming up, imagine having the job of trying to hold the democrats in the house together as a caucus. The job of cat herder would be easier. And in a moment we will talk to that very man. And Andrew Sullivan is here to talk about why he thinks the Mueller Report is textbook definition of high crimes and misdemeanors as the 11th hour gets started, tiptoeing through the tulips as we do on a tuesday night. The latest innovation from xfinity isnt just a store. Its a save more with a new kind of Wireless Network store. Its a look what your wifi can do now store. A get your questions answered by awesome experts store. Its a now theres one store that connects your life like never before store. The xfinity store is here. And its simple, easy, awesome. I do believe that impeachment is one of the most divisive forces, paths that we could go down to in our country. But its if the path of fact finding take uzus there, we have no choice. But were not there yet. Congress will not be silent in terms of using our constitutional power to find the facts for the American People. The speaker today encouraging patience over how the democrats in congress should handle revelations in the Mueller Report. Problem is a lot of democrats are running out of patience. And thats fueling tension within the party especially between democrats on capitol hill and the 19 or so democrats who are running around the country running for president. In spite of the party split over impeachment things are heating up for the president and some of those around him. Democrats leaders have launched a series of investigations including as we mentioned hauling in don mcgahn before the House Judiciary Committee, but tonight the president tells the Washington Post, quote, he opposes cooperation with House Democrats who he claimed are trying to score political points against him. Our next guest is one of those democrats and a proud product of brooklyn, new york, congressman hakeem jeffries. Sits on the House Judiciary Committee and more importantly these days hes the party guy on the house majority. Hes the chairman of the Democratic House caucus. Thank you for coming on. How do you think youre going to decide whether or not to pursue impeachment and is one way just to proceed with hearings that are except for the title, impeachment hearings in name only . Well, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has laid out a clear standard for how to proceed and its a standard that the overall majority of the House Democratic caucus embraces. That is that the case for impeachment must be compelling. The evidence must be overwhe